So, Search Me

Part 7

It only took Draco half a flight of stairs to realise that Potter wouldn't be up there. If he was as smart as Snape obviously expected him of being - Draco's mind fizzed a bit more at the ridiculousness of it all - then he would have been out the front door before they even managed to switch their engines on.

Outside then. But where? Would he have just left? No goodbye? But why not? Draco was just a casual fuck, right? A casual fuck simmering with sexual tension and natural attraction, albeit, but still...

No goodbye then. Probably gone.

So why did Draco feel like he should go around the building? Call it a cop sense or intuition but it had rarely led him wrong before. What did he have to lose anyway, there was nothing at the top of those stairs except a group of stressed, aggressive officers pumped full of testosterone with nowhere to vent it.

Out the swinging door. Around the building. Avoiding the used condoms. Across the road. Startlingly quiet.

There were trees everywhere; bushy furs that spread out before him and covered the children's park from view. Draco glanced guiltily back at the building only to realise he was completely under the shelter of the trees.

The climbing frame was rusted orange and peeling but the swings still stood, the chains creaking in the wind. Whether it was habit or the reaction to seeing him, Draco drew his gun from its holster and felt his knees lowering. Eyes sharp. Feet silent. He crept through the branches, flicking the moisture from his hair and avidly pretending he wasn't developing some sort of nervous twitch.

"It's nice, isn't it?" Potter murmured just loud enough for him to hear. He froze. Minutes crawled by. Draco refused to break his silence as if it would be a kind of moral loss against Potter. "I know you're there, idiot. I can here you breathing." He turned his face slightly. "And you reek of sex," he hissed, leering back at Draco over his shoulder. His clothes were as ratty as usual but the rucksack that sat innocently beside him was weighed down with hidden goods and the multitude of zips sparkled new.

"Going somewhere?" he said, shuffling forward and onto the weed crusted tarmac.

Potter swivelled around on the swing, the chain twisting above him.

"You know I can't stay here." His face was serious and Draco wondered how his lips could still look so tempting even though he knew Potter was evil incarnate. "I'm thinking north. The cold always suited me better anyway." His head fell back and he gazed at the clouds. For some reason, this vulnerability made Draco slip his gun back into its holster and he took another step forward, gently perching against one rusted bar of the scabbed frame.

"So, was that the most original name you could come up with?" He asked, glancing at Potter from the corner of his eye. Potter barked laughter up into the sky.

"Don't play coy, Malfoy. Who do you think I am? A cop?" He sniggered at his own joke again. Then he turned to Draco and caught his stare, eyes like ice and more serious than Draco had ever seen them. Cold. Deadly. For the first time Draco felt a chill shift down his spine at the possibility that Potter might be more involved than he thought possible. Crueller. Perhaps even...

"Are you 'the Scar'?" He said willing with all his brainpower that his voice stayed level. Potter just stared at him grimly. Never blinking. Never moving. Just the wind stirring his hair around the unnatural stillness of his body in the eerie silence of this otherworld they had come to.

And then he started laughing. Hysterical, belly-deep laughs that shook his entire body. Draco glanced behind him, broken from the spell, suddenly worried they would be surrounded at any second.

"Don't be thick, Malfoy." He huffed between giggles. "I'm not a fucking criminal mastermind. Did I shag your brains out or something?" He bent double again and let out steams of whooping breaths. Draco didn't think it was the right time to inform him that, yes actually, he may well have shagged his brains right out of him and into that bloody fucking coffee mug he could see poking out of his bag.

And then it hit him. Like an elephant charging its rival. The shitting wankering bloody sodding fucking coffee cup. The only thing in the whole shitting apartment he hadn't checked.

"Fuck's sake," he muttered, catching Potters attention, complete with sparkling eyes. God he'd reduced Potter to tears of laughter with his moronic theories. No! Snape's moronic theories. But still...there was that stare... "That mug. That's where you've been hiding your stash isn't it. Right under my fucking nose, you arsehole!" His voices screeched out of his throat and he suddenly felt like he'd swallowed a tin of nails. His eyes felt wet and his hands shook at his sides. He felt strangely betrayed and he wasn't entirely sure why. He'd known all along there was the possibility, the very real possibility, that Potter was a 'bad guy', an outcast of the law, and yet he'd jumped straight into bed with him anyway - or the shower as the case may be.

"I hoped you'd figure it out at some point. And it's not my entire stash. Just my home recreational. For personal use." He smirked up at Draco from under his fringe and in two seconds Draco went from utterly devastated in heart-swelling betrayal to murderous. His fingers itched to squeeze that pale, little neck.

"I'm going to have to arrest you, Mr Potter," he informed him, straightening his spine and using his full height. Intimidation was the key to this arrest, he assured himself.

"No you're not, Malfoy."

"What?" He growled, prowling closer and not even pausing when Potter swung back around and jumped to his feet.

"Well, you would have done it by now." He inched closer while Draco once again found his feet glued to the uneven floor beneath him. "What's going to happen is I'm going to go that way," he said pointing behind him erratically, "and you're going to go back that way," again with the finger wiggle, "and then we're never going to see each other again. Into the sunset and all that crap. It's been nice, Malfoy, but really, I've got to get going. Brass on my tail and all that." He grinned up at Draco, showing off his pearly teeth but made no move to back away or turn.

Draco started to speak before his brain even registered what he was saying.

"No, I don't think so. That's not what's going to happen either. You're going to walk whichever direction you like and then I'm going to follow you at a reasonable distance until you accept that, in whatever fucked up way, this is some crappy partnership which I and you, don't lie because I can see it in your eyes and in your hesitation, are going to continue until either I'm tired of fucking you, and I wouldn't bet on that, or until I receive any or all of my mental capacities of logic back."

They stood there huffing and puffing at each other. Eyes wide and mouths hanging limp. Potter pulled himself together first.

"And what? You think I'm just going to roll over and take it like a goddamned street whore. I work alone, Malfoy."

"Like I said, you don't have a choice."

Potter's eyes glowed with excitement and he was practically vibrating with the adrenalin. But all Draco could do was wonder where all these words were spewing up from and when they had become more truthful than an act to delay or confuse Potter. 'Never were,' his mind whispered sadistically in his ear sounding suspiciously like Potter in that hissing whisper he used right after he'd come...which set Draco's determination entirely.

Potter leapt toward him, grabbing a handful of his mussed shirt and sliding his fingers through his unkempt hair. He pecked their lips together for one tantalising moment before drawing back and swaggering back over to his abandoned bag.

"Well, we'll have to see if you can keep up with me first."

Sorry it was so late, but it just didn't want to go the way I wanted it to.

Hope you weren't too disappointed with it. This is unbeta's and rather rushed because I wanted to get it written while I had the drive to do it. And now I can move on.

Sorry for any mistakes.

I intentionally left it a little bit open, just in case a sequel is called for then I've got lots of options but mainly because I wanted to let you guys end it how you wanted.

Review if you please.

Bella